Tony Docherty is refusing to regard the coming week as a potentially season-defining one for Dundee.
The Dark Blues slipped to 11th in the Premiership table following Saturday’s 2-1 defeat at Dens to Aberdeen.
Docherty’s men now face a crunch triple-header starting on Saturday at 10th-placed Ross County, followed by another trip to Motherwell before a game against rock bottom St Johnstone at Dens in the space of seven days.
However, Docherty is sticking by his mantra of one game at a time and does not see the next three fixtures as season-defining.
The Dens boss insisted: “I don’t. I don’t want to hype it up that way, because I just look at the next game.
“I’ll go into a lot of detail – the staff behind the scenes are doing that on the Motherwell game and the St Johnstone game.
“But for me and the players, the full focus is on Ross County on Saturday.
“Once we get that over, we’ll look at the next game, but I don’t think you can look too far ahead.”
Docherty added: “It’s the business end of the season, this is when it really, really kicks in.
“It’s important we focus on every game now.
“We do that anyway, but every game is a proverbial cup tie, so we’ve got seven league ones.
“We’ll take it game by game and just make sure that we do our utmost to try to get us in a position where we’re healthy.”
While Dundee are second bottom of the table, they are only four points behind St Mirren in sixth.
And Docherty knows the tightness of the league means a lot can change in the space of a couple of weeks.
He added: “No prizes are given at this time of year, there’s no league standings at this time of year, but it’s just important that you keep your focus.
“Any team can be in the position that we find ourselves in at the moment and it’ll change week to week.
“It is an old cliche, but it’s true, you need to focus on each game and let performances take care of results.
“I’ve got a strong belief in the players and they’ve got a strong belief in each other.”
Several senior Dundee players including club captain Joe Shaughnessy were given a run-out in a reserve game against Dunfermline on Monday.
Shaughnessy is making his way back from a cruciate injury and Docherty admitted the Irish defender is edging closer to a first-team start.
The manager added: “We had a reserve game on Tuesday and more came through, getting their minutes.
“Joe Shaughnessy and Imari Samuels are getting up to speed, Victor Lopez, Charlie Reilly and Harry Sharpe also got minutes.
“Joe’s making progress, he’s getting much closer.”
Scott Tiffoney came off at half-time against Aberdeen and was replaced by striker Seb Palmer-Houlden.
And Docherty revealed why he made the change, saying: “Tiff was feeling his ankle a wee bit, but I just felt as if we needed to get more of a presence up there.
“Scott Fraser and Billy Koumetio are the ones that are still unavailable.”
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